It is important for a driver of a vehicle to be aware of other objects and vehicles in proximity to the driver's vehicle. It would be ideal if a driver had circumferential vision to be able to see all the way around the vehicle at all times. However, due to the forward-facing placement of a driver's eyes, supplemental visual devices have been introduced to augment a driver's view around a vehicle. Two of the most popular devices used are mirrors and, more recently, the addition of cameras.
In both of these cases, the supplemental visual device (i.e. mirror(s) or a camera monitor) is placed in the forward field of view of a driver giving the driver a view to the side and/or rear of the vehicle. Unfortunately, these forward-placed devices must be limited to a suitable size that does not block the driver's normal forward field of view outside of the vehicle. As a result, visual blind spots are formed wherein the driver does not have a complete view of the side and/or rear of the vehicle. In other words, objects and vehicles that are positioned within a visual blind spot can not be seen by the driver. Detecting such objects or vehicles in a blind spot is important for a driver. In particular, this is important for those cases when a driver wishes to change lanes. To resolve this problem, a typical solution is for a driver to turnaround and glance at their blind spots before changing lanes. However, this requires drivers to take their eyes off of the road in front of them, which is not desirable even for a brief moment.
Another solution, available in Europe, is to provide a convex portion for the side view mirrors in a vehicle. The convex portion enlarges the sideward view of a driver in a continuous manner to encompass the vehicle blind spot. However, this option is not legal in the United States at the present time. Another less desirable solution is for the driver to use the available mirror controls in the car to adjust to see the blind spot. However, such mirror controls are often slow-moving and difficult to control causing more distractions than help. Another solution is to provide more mirrors to cover different rear or side views. However, this blocks more of the forward view of the driver. Still other solutions provide some indication to the driver that an object is detected somewhere near the vehicle, but these do not provide a view of such objects.
Therefore, it is desirable to provide an improved technique to view objects in a blind spot of a vehicle that overcomes most, if not all, of the preceding problems. It would also be beneficial if a technique could be provided to maintain such blind spot objects within the view of the driver.
While the invention is susceptible to various modifications and alternative forms, specific embodiments have been shown by way of example in the drawings and will be described in detail herein. However, it should be understood that the invention is not intended to be limited to the particular forms disclosed. Rather, the invention is to cover all modifications, equivalents and alternatives falling within the broad scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.